Search

In this week’s TLS

The Life of Luther, Christian silence, “mad-doctors” – A note from the Religion Editor

Published: 27 March 2013

“
It is very odd that people should think that when we do good God will reward
us and when we do evil he will punish us”, said Herbert McCabe, the renowned
Catholic thinker. In other words, Christianity does not teach that we will
get our just deserts. Christians confess their sins because they are
forgiven, not in order to obtain forgiveness. This was the crucial insight
that liberated Luther from a pit of despair over his own sins, helping him
to frame the doctrine of justification. As McCabe’s comment shows, though,
Catholics and Protestants are now agreed on a principle that stoked endless
strife five centuries ago. The story is told in Heinz Schilling’s major
German-language Life of Luther, discussed this week by Joachim
Whaley.

Reviewing Diarmaid MacCulloch’s Silence
in Christian History, Lucy Beckett notes that silent prayer in the
ancient world was viewed as suspect. This makes Jesus’s avoidance of words –
especially during his temptations and at his trial – all the more
noteworthy. MacCulloch also writes of sinister silences in the Church,
including during the Holocaust and the recent child abuse scandals.

Last week marked a first in modern times: the enthronements of a pope and an
archbishop of Canterbury within two days of each other. Joseph Ratzinger
(pictured) and Rowan Williams, the out-going holders of these posts, are
considered by Tom Wright and Bernice Martin respectively. Wright reviews the
final instalment of the former pontiff’s three-volume study of Jesus.
Benedict XVI famously declared himself too old to govern the Church. But his
record of publications demonstrates that, for good or ill, he devoted much
of his reign to private study.

One major perversion of religion during Luther’s era involved the persecution
of witches. Yet as Sarah Wise reveals in her book Inconvenient People,
reviewed by Andrew Scull, bigotry continued to prosper in other guises.
During the nineteenth century, both men and women were often falsely accused
of lunacy by the very people – “mad-doctors” – who were meant to be
promoting their care.